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siakou's review against another edition
3.0
The rating is more like 2.5/5.
For someone who read plenty of detective stories, films and tv series I can definitely say I’m more accustomed to solving mysteries from the detective’s perspective.
This didn’t help at all with the "mysterious” aspect of this books cause the outcome was quite clear to me from early on.
I just wanted to get to the end to see the details and if I was right.
Other than that, there were plenty of WTF moments that just worked but the extreme stupidity of it all was quite obvious.
In my opinion, if you’re relying on the main character making stupid decisions in order to keep the plot running for another 100 pages, you’re doing something wrong.
But cherry on top was the ending.
The only place the author could provide a clear view of what happens next that nobody could have predicted just didn’t and decided to close everything off in a poetic way that I didn’t enjoy at all.
For someone who read plenty of detective stories, films and tv series I can definitely say I’m more accustomed to solving mysteries from the detective’s perspective.
This didn’t help at all with the "mysterious” aspect of this books cause the outcome was quite clear to me from early on.
I just wanted to get to the end to see the details and if I was right.
Other than that, there were plenty of WTF moments that just worked but the extreme stupidity of it all was quite obvious.
In my opinion, if you’re relying on the main character making stupid decisions in order to keep the plot running for another 100 pages, you’re doing something wrong.
But cherry on top was the ending.
The only place the author could provide a clear view of what happens next that nobody could have predicted just didn’t and decided to close everything off in a poetic way that I didn’t enjoy at all.
ariellenb's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
emnoelle88's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
jennythrasher's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
nikkirene161's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
probably_confused's review against another edition
dark
emotional
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
ninasbooks57's review against another edition
5.0
The story kept me guessing right up to the end!! Amazing book!!
isaac_c's review against another edition
1.0
Despite everything promised by the marketing, the plot of A Flicker in the Dark is pretty average, which unfortunately allows its flaws to shine all the brighter.
Firstly, the overall writing quality is just fine, but it made me kind of roll my eyes at a couple points with the similes and other lyrical(?) lines coming from our first-person narrator. You've got to have a certain suspension of disbelief when it comes to these things, because obviously authors don't need to forego all style just because their story is in first-person POV, but it got to the point where I was asking myself, "who would think about their life like this?"
Second... everything else. I'll just start with the fact that I didn't really like Chloe: she tells a lot of lies and makes a lot of excuses, and all of them suck! You might read it as a character flaw, but it seems to me like she sometimes does things just because the plot necessitates it, without any illusion that she could be a real person making her own choices. Chloe isn't necessarily the only character that falls into this, but she's the most obvious.
For example,the first instance that really bothered me was Chloe's mom trying to spell out what she knows about the missing girls, but all she manages is D-A. Chloe, beyond a shadow of a doubt, believes that this means Daniel is the culprit. Of course, she's already suspicious of him, but she just decides to never revisit this... not even to find out how her mom would know Daniel in the first place.
But the most egregious example is when Chloe arrives home and finds her alarm system disabled. Still believing Daniel to be a murderer (or at least accomplice) on the loose, she obviously goes to a friend's house for the ni—wait, no. She thinks, of course the alarm is off, Daniel left earlier!, goes inside and takes a bath. Uh. Okay? To be fair she was exhausted I guess, but it just seemed so out of character. (In an absolutely unexpected turn of events, Daniel was in the house waiting for her.)
But there were a lot of other oddly convenient events or choices that stood out to me.Daniel just happened to keep newspaper clippings about Dick Davis in his copy of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, which definitely doesn't seem extremely suspicious when your sister is about to disappear. Which he knows about, because he's actually spiriting her away from their abusive dad. Yeah, this whole sequence doesn't quite make sense to me. Why did he need to keep the newspaper after his spark of inspiration? Because Chloe needed to find it and assume the worst. And I have absolutely no clue where Sophie went when she disappeared, or how the police never realized since it's not like she changed her identity or anything. Like I said, it all felt very convenient.
And of course, there was theconfrontation with Aaron. So, this man drugs Chloe and then accidentally leaves his ID with her, which she pockets upon waking. Chloe decides her old house must be where the girls are being killed, which she's right about for some reason. The fake ID then allows Chloe to unlock the backdoor, which happens to be "the right kind of lock." The card is damaged, something she notices after it falls out of her pocket and she sees it on the ground while talking to Aaron—and that's when she realizes it's fake and that this man isn't who he says he is.
EDIT: I forgot about this until I read other reviews! Chloe states that she's hoping to get her masters, after her PHD. Which seems like a really obvious mistake to have been left in by the author and editors.
There's more than just these examples, but suffice to say that the logical flow of this book is lacking, and maybe it needed another research pass... I've read a lot worse, honestly, but it's hard to give this book a higher rating with everything it did wrong.
Firstly, the overall writing quality is just fine, but it made me kind of roll my eyes at a couple points with the similes and other lyrical(?) lines coming from our first-person narrator. You've got to have a certain suspension of disbelief when it comes to these things, because obviously authors don't need to forego all style just because their story is in first-person POV, but it got to the point where I was asking myself, "who would think about their life like this?"
Second... everything else. I'll just start with the fact that I didn't really like Chloe: she tells a lot of lies and makes a lot of excuses, and all of them suck! You might read it as a character flaw, but it seems to me like she sometimes does things just because the plot necessitates it, without any illusion that she could be a real person making her own choices. Chloe isn't necessarily the only character that falls into this, but she's the most obvious.
For example,
But the most egregious example is when Chloe arrives home and finds her alarm system disabled. Still believing Daniel to be a murderer (or at least accomplice) on the loose, she obviously goes to a friend's house for the ni—wait, no. She thinks, of course the alarm is off, Daniel left earlier!, goes inside and takes a bath. Uh. Okay? To be fair she was exhausted I guess, but it just seemed so out of character. (In an absolutely unexpected turn of events, Daniel was in the house waiting for her.)
But there were a lot of other oddly convenient events or choices that stood out to me.
And of course, there was the
EDIT: I forgot about this until I read other reviews! Chloe states that she's hoping to get her masters, after her PHD. Which seems like a really obvious mistake to have been left in by the author and editors.
There's more than just these examples, but suffice to say that the logical flow of this book is lacking, and maybe it needed another research pass... I've read a lot worse, honestly, but it's hard to give this book a higher rating with everything it did wrong.
nuttus's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.25
I saw the main plot twist coming from page 46 or something
linoswalt's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.75
A really good intro to thriller book.